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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25006459">Come on Feel the Illinoise</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/goodoldfashioned/pseuds/goodoldfashioned'>goodoldfashioned</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>RedLetterMedia RPF</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Chicago (City), Comic-Con, Conventions, Drinking, Friends to Lovers, Hook-Up, Hotels, M/M, Partying, Sharing a Room, Swimming Pools</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-07-01</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-07-01</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-04 05:07:12</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Explicit</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>18,454</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25006459</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/goodoldfashioned/pseuds/goodoldfashioned</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Chicago, 2011: A VCR repair convention shares its hotel and venue with a comic con. Jay gets caught up in the excitement and has a new experience. Mike gets drunk, then heartsick, then determined.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Mike/Jay</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>20</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>62</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Come on Feel the Illinoise</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>I was working on something else that I kinda got stuck on (not the Manhole story, I'm gonna get back to that one now!), and I felt like writing a story about these two at a con after rewatching one of the old comic con videos and feeling extremely nostalgic about huge crowds and heedless drinking in public.</p><p>Also, importantly: Sam this is dedicated to you and your brilliant idea that inspired me!!!! &lt;3 &lt;3 &lt;3 !!</p><p>This is about the Half in the Baaaaaaaag characters and their world only.</p><p> </p><p>*</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Mike is like eighty-nine percent sure he’s going to hate this, but it’s for work and he has no choice, so he packs a bag for the weekend and picks Jay up on Friday for the drive to Midwest Vintage Repair Con 2011. It’s a glorious summer morning that Mike should be sleeping through, but they’ve been ordered by Lightning Fast Corporate to go to this convention and somehow promote the brand while sitting at a card table all weekend and glowering at passerby. </p><p>They’ve been given a per diem that Mike fully plans to spend on mini bar booze, which is the only upshot. He’ll have to share a room with Jay, and he’s not sure what horrors await there. He’s known Jay since they made a pact to drop out of film school together, which only Jay followed through on, and though that was over ten years ago and they’ve worked together at the shop for most of the past decade, Mike still finds Jay mysterious and kind of creepy, to the point that he half expects to wake up and find Jay doing some dark midnight ritual in their hotel room, maybe floating over the bed and summoning demons. It’s also just weird to imagine sharing a tiny bottle of hotel room shampoo with Jay, though he isn’t sure why. He’s fallen asleep on the couch at Jay’s apartment probably a hundred times over the years, and once even nodded off on the sofa in the back room at the shop and woke up with his head on Jay’s shoulder. Jay was pretty cool about it, in the sense that he just kept watching the boring movie they had on and pretended not to notice. </p><p>Jay is more spritely about the convention thing, possibly just glad for the excuse to not spend the whole weekend slumping around his apartment watching gross movies and eating Funyuns. He gives Mike his gap-toothed smile when he’s in the passenger seat, and rifles around in his bag for something he wants to show him.</p><p>“Check it out,” he says, holding up a handful of glossy print-outs. “I made stickers to give away at the con. To advertise the shop.” </p><p>Mike frowns down at the things before taking one to examine it more closely.</p><p>“You did this at your own expense?” Mike says, looking at Jay like he’s nuts, ‘cause he is.</p><p>Jay shrugs and snatches the sticker back, stashing it with the others in his bag. He probably designed them himself, too, with the shop’s logo and two clumsily drawn cartoon figures in the bottom right corner, presumably representing the two of them, since one of the figures is fatter than the other and has angry eyebrows, while the smaller one has spiked hair and buck teeth. </p><p>“I just miss making stuff, I guess,” Jay mumbles. </p><p>“It’s cute,” Mike says, and Jay jerks his head around to look at him as if that was a particularly scathing insult. “I’m serious,” Mike says, monotone. “My only objection is that you’re wasting your talents on this company’s behalf.” </p><p>“That’s what we’re both doing, Mike. We’ve been doing it for ten years now. It’s basically our legacy.”</p><p>“Oh. True. Okay, let’s go get our souls sucked out by this convention.”</p><p>“You’re so dramatic. Maybe it’ll be fun.”</p><p>“Jay.” Mike stops himself from saying that Jay could have fun in a cardboard box. Jay would take it as an insult. Mike is just envious of his sunny demeanor, though he’s long suspected there are many dark horrors lurking beneath it. </p><p>“What?” Jay asks, frowning.</p><p>“Nothing. You’re right. Fun times ahead, maybe. Stranger things have happened.”</p><p>“I made us a playlist,” Jay says, plugging his phone into the wire-clogged rigging on the dash that normally accommodates Mike's ancient mp3 player. “For the drive.” </p><p>Mike doesn’t say anything. Like the stickers, this is cute, and Jay won’t appreciate being told so. The first song is the Talking Heads, of course, but it’s one of the ones Mike likes, too, and feels appropriate for the start of a trip out of town, optimistic and upbeat like Jay himself.</p><p>“Excited to be headed to your hometown?” Jay asks when they’re on the highway, the windows on Mike’s old car cracked because the air conditioning is on its last leg, barely offering any relief from the heat. </p><p>“Not really,” Mike says. </p><p>“But you love Chicago. And you haven’t been in a while, have you?”</p><p>“Eh,” Mike says. </p><p>He has mixed feelings. Growing up in Chicago was both great and terrible. It’s also where he met Jay, in film school, and where he mercilessly picked on Jay for being a hayseed from a farm town with a population of like 800 people in Wisconsin, unable to let it go even when he could see Jay was losing his sense of humor about it. They got into a physical fight at one point during Jay’s freshman year, when Mike was extremely drunk and Jay wasn’t. Jay punched Mike as hard as he could in the jaw, which wasn’t very. When Mike woke up from his blackout Jay was curled up asleep on the floor by Mike’s dorm room bed, and he was panicked when Mike roused him, apologizing and explaining like he thought Mike was going to press charges or something. </p><p>Instead they became best friends. Mike has nothing but respect for people who punch him in the face when he deserves it, which so far has only ever been Jay, who is therefore the only person he really respects.</p><p>“This hotel looks pretty sweet,” Jay says, sifting through the registration packet they got from Corporate. “Too bad we have to share a room.”</p><p>“Yeah, where are you gonna bring all your hot repair lady hookups?”</p><p>That was a joke Mike shouldn’t have made, so he keeps his eyes on the road ahead and smirks like he’s unaware that he’s being cruel, because Jay prefers that to being called out on having feelings and the fact that Mike can still hurt them sometimes. </p><p>“Just don’t make me walk in on anything gross,” Jay says, muttering this under his breath and still staring down at the hotel brochure, because of course Mike is the one who will maybe bring a woman back to the room, not Jay. </p><p>Or maybe he’s talking about walking in on Mike jerking off. They’ve discussed the frequency with which they do it. Mike can get himself off four times a day if he’s bored and too depressed to go out looking for some other kind of sex, usually on cold Sunday afternoons. Jay claims he can go a whole week without beating off. He says he just ‘gets bored of it.’ Mike thinks that probably means he’s doing it wrong. </p><p>But generally he shouldn’t press Jay about anything to do with sex, because Jay doesn’t have it with other people and obviously feels bad or weird about that in some kind of way. If he’d come down one way or another on some kind of sexual identity, Mike would be less obnoxiously obsessed with tormenting him about what the deal is. Maybe. Jay just shrugs with aggressive passivity and rolls up like a pill bug if poked about it. It’s not like Mike wants him go to broadcasting it to everyone or anyone before he’s ready. It’s just that Mike is his best friend, goddammit. Jay is supposed to trust him with this shit. </p><p>Traffic gets bad when they near the city, and Mike’s stomach starts growling. Jay is chattering happily about some restaurant he wants to go to for dinner, and the thought of food makes Mike groan longingly. </p><p>“We’re almost there,” Jay says, holding up the Garmin to demonstrate. “Guess we’ll have to do registration, and check-in, and then we can get some lunch.”</p><p>“I should have eaten some breakfast,” Mike says, his heel bouncing on the floorboard as he waits for their exit to appear up ahead, cars crawling slowly along the clogged-up highway. </p><p>“I have some cookies in my bag,” Jay says. “If you want?”</p><p>“Of course I want, yes.” </p><p>Mike should have known Jay had cookies. He keeps talking about getting fat and needing to diet, but he has a sweet tooth and stays up till four in the morning eating candy corn in all seasons. When they met, Jay was rail thin and Mike was pretty fit. The past decade has been beer-filled and not particularly kind to either of them. At least Jay isn’t losing his hair. Mike knows he should probably try to get married or something before he loses any more of the handsomeness he never had to try for when he was younger. It was always just there-- Well, not always, not when he was a gangly teenager who went to Star Trek conventions, but even then he got girls. Now he feels like he’s running out of time to do something, personal or professional or somewhere in between, but he just keeps treading water beside Jay, because what would Jay do without him?</p><p>The convention is by the airport, at the Stephens Center, and their room is at the Crowne Plaza. Though Lightning Fast is paying the bill, Mike still resents the insane fee to park in the garage attached to the hotel. He eyes the bar as they’re checking in, though he really needs to get some food in him before he starts enjoying beers on the company dime. </p><p>“What the fuck,” Jay says, nudging Mike as they’re waiting for the elevator. The group waiting near them are a handful of teens or maybe people in their twenties; Mike can’t tell the difference anymore. They’re wearing outlandish clothes, Halloween-like, though if these are costumes Mike doesn’t recognize what they’re from. Mike saw others like them on the way in and assumed some kind of music festival is going on nearby. </p><p>“You guys here for the repair convention?” Mike asks, so Jay will huff with embarrassment beside him. He’s pleased when Jay does so, on cue.</p><p>All the teens or whatever turn to give Mike a once-over. The girls are pretty, if a little insane-looking in what appear to be whimsical French maid costumes in wild colors. Mike has the Shatner cover of “Common People” stuck in his head, the last song he heard on Jay’s road trip playlist, and he kind of feels like partying already, even if these particular kids are too young for him. </p><p>“Yeah, we’re here for the con,” one of the girls says. “Are you?”</p><p>“Wait, seriously?” Mike grins. “Are you booth girls?”</p><p>“Jesus!” Jay says, but the girls laugh like they’re flattered. The skinny dudes they’re with, who are decked out in Matrix-ish getups with fake swords, start to look annoyed. </p><p>“We’re just regular attendees,” the prettiest girl says, grinning at him. “Is this y’all’s first comic con?”</p><p>“Our first what?”</p><p>“We’re here for work,” Jay says, prissily enough to almost make Mike laugh out loud. “The Vintage Repair con.”</p><p>“What’s that?” one of the guys asks.</p><p>“It’s for enthusiasts of ancient technology,” Mike says. “And those of us who make their money off them.”</p><p>The group stares at them as if that went over their heads, and the elevator arrives. Everyone piles inside, and it’s a tight fight that leaves Mike pressed between one of the surly guys in the group and Jay, who fidgets beside him. </p><p>“Have fun,” Mike says when the comic con group exits the elevator on the fifth floor. </p><p>“You too!” the pretty girl says, smiling at him as they leave. </p><p>“I still got it,” Mike says when the elevator doors are closed and they’re ascending again.</p><p>“She was like sixteen,” Jay says.</p><p>“Uhh, no way. Twenty, at least. You’re just confused by the childish outfit.” </p><p>“Yeah, I’m the one who’s confused, okay.”</p><p>Mike snorts.</p><p>“Relax,” Mike says, elbowing Jay as they make their way out of the elevator. “I was only kidding. I’m not going to try to fuck comic con girls while we’re here.”</p><p>“I’ll believe that when I see it.”</p><p>Mike has to admit that if he happens upon other pretty people who are a bit older, he’ll try to bed them or at least make out with them at the hotel bar. It’s been a while since he’s gotten laid, which is worrying. He’s not losing his touch when it comes to flirting, clearly, but the whole going out and picking people up thing is getting tiring. He’s thirty-three, but he feels older. At night, alone in his apartment, he wants someone there to fall asleep with their head in his lap while he watches TV more than he wants someone to put their head in his lap for the purpose of sucking his dick, most nights. Both would also be good.</p><p>“Hey, this is nice,” Mike says when they’re walking into the room on the twelfth floor, with two pristine double beds and a big wall-mounted TV. “Great view of the parking lot!” he says from the window. “Wow, and look. There’s lots of comic con freaks out there.” </p><p>“Don’t call them freaks.”</p><p>Jay appears at Mike’s side to observe. The parking lot is full of people in costumes, a few that Mike recognizes even from a distance, like Batman and the Joker. </p><p>“I’m starting to think you’re right,” Mike says, shouldering him. “This is going to be fun.”</p><p>“At least it won’t be boring,” Jay says, looking wary, like he had some kind of idea about how this weekend was going to go, and comic con is throwing a wrench in it. </p><p>“I’ll drink to that!” Mike says, and he makes for the mini bar. </p><p>They split a celebratory rum and Coke before heading back down to find the Vintage Con registration table, which proves difficult both because they’re a little tipsy after one drink on their empty stomachs and because the hotel and convention center are slammed with comic con attendees who clog the halls to pose for pictures. </p><p>Once they’re wearing their badges, which regrettably say MICHAEL and JERRY since Corporate did their registration, they head to the hotel bar to order beers and ridiculously overpriced hotel restaurant burgers. Jay pages through the programming schedule while they wait for their food to arrive. </p><p>“The opening ceremonies presentation is at five,” Jay says. “The guest speaker is some old British guy who repairs music boxes.”</p><p>“Boring,” Mike says. “Next?”</p><p>“Cocktail reception at six. Two drink tickets per attendee.” </p><p>“Ha. Now we’re talkin’. Did you bring your swimsuit?”</p><p>“My swimsuit?” Jay looks up at Mike like he’s crazy. </p><p>“Yeah, this place has a pool. We’re kinda on vacation here, Jay, and maybe the comic con people will have a pool party. Don’t worry-- I knew you’d forget, so I brought an extra pair of swim trunks for you.”</p><p>“I don’t want to wear your swim trunks, Mike.” </p><p>“Don’t be such a prude. They’re clean.” </p><p>“Anyway,” Jay says, looking down at the program to hide the blush that Mike already saw. “After the cocktail reception we’re expected to find dinner on our own, and then there’s karaoke, ugh, pass. Oh, and the Exhibitor’s hall opens in an hour. I want to check that out.”</p><p>“Sounds good to me, Jerry.”</p><p>Jay snorts and looks up at Mike as the bartender brings their burgers over. They’re enormous and served with a mountain of fries. Mike’s mouth waters at the scent of them. </p><p>“Is that gonna be your thing all weekend?” Jay asks, reaching for the bottle of ketchup that the bartender set down when he brought their beers. </p><p>“What?” Mike asks, with a mouthful of burger.</p><p>“Calling me Jerry. Like you used to call me hayseed, until I punched you for it.”</p><p>“That was great,” Mike says, after swallowing. “Great moment in my life.”</p><p>“You’re the first person I ever punched in the face,” Jay says, grinning down at his plate as he smacks ketchup from the bottle, pooling it beside his fries. </p><p>“You grew up with two brothers, and I’m the first person you punched?”</p><p>“I said in the face. I punched them in plenty of other places when we were kids.”</p><p>Jay also has two sisters. It’s part of what Mike loves about his wholesome hayseed backstory. He has this massive happy family, everyone blond and smiley and prone to polite laughter just like Jay, and still Jay wants Mike to believe he’s some kind of prince of darkness, at least when it comes to his taste in media and his obsessively secretive personal life, or lack thereof.</p><p>“Remember when I used to torture you with that Cotton Eye Joe remix?” Mike asks.</p><p>“Uhh, yes. You broke into my room like fifteen times to set my alarm to that song. It was kind of creepy, actually.”</p><p>“Yeah, I suppose.”</p><p>“And you told that girl in our class that my favorite movie was <i>Son in Law</i>--”</p><p>“Because you could relate to the farm girl goes off to college in the big city plotline so much! Look, I didn’t expect her to actually believe me. It’s not my fault she was kind of a dummy.”</p><p>“You didn’t like that I was friends with her,” Jay says, giving Mike a look like he’s never really thought of it this way before. “You had the strangest way of trying to be friends with me.”</p><p>“I wasn’t--” Mike starts to argue, but then he just shrugs and eats more of his burger. </p><p>When he thinks back on it now, he’s pretty sure he was trying to flirt with Jay more than strike up some kind of friendship with him. During Mike’s senior year, after Jay had dropped out of the program and moved to Milwaukee, Mike finally slept with a few guys. It was around then, between doing that and missing the fuck out of Jay, so much so that Mike moved to Milwaukee himself after graduating, that he figured out his own deal regarding sex, which is that he likes having it with women mostly but with guys sometimes, and that he probably wanted to fuck Jay almost immediately upon meeting him, hence all the torture and the pleasure of being punched in the face by Jay for it, then finding him asleep on the floor the morning after. </p><p>They bill their burgers and drinks to the room after ordering more beers in plastic to-go cups to carry into the Exhibitor’s hall. One thing Mike enjoys about conventions is that they encourage day drinking and drinking in general, to get everyone in the spirit of socializing. The comic con kids are already getting louder, out in the lobby. </p><p>“Here’s where we’ll be tomorrow,” Jay says when they find the numbered card table they’ve been assigned during the expanded Saturday vending hours. </p><p>“I’m glad you made those stickers,” Mike says, drunk enough now to be sincere. “That’ll be a nice touch.”</p><p>Jay snorts but is also smiling, looking down at the empty table like he’s got big plans for it. </p><p>The Exhibitor hall is full of all kinds of high end, old fashioned tech, and Jay is fascinated. Mike watches him browse and grunts in reply to his commentary on things he wants to buy, or shouldn’t buy, or which he can’t believe anyone would ever buy. Nobody in the Vintage Con area is as hot or interesting as the comic con crowd. Jay is wearing his usual summer attire of a t-shirt that would be big even on Mike and covers him like a tent, long shorts, white socks and black Converse. Tomorrow they’ll have to wear their Lightning Fast shirts until they’re liberated from the vendor table at five o’clock. Mike brought a couple of nice button-up shirts with short sleeves that look good on him, and at this point he’s planning on trying to pick someone up tomorrow night, but for now he’s glad just to be hanging out with Jay as usual. It’s been a while since they took a trip together. The last one was to New York, also for work, and they flew back home on the red eye after their shoot wrapped rather than spending the money to stay at a hotel in the city. Mike hates New York. Jay likes it, but he likes everything. He fell asleep on the flight home and Mike was delirious enough to stare at him for a while, pretending to be looking out the window at the featureless dark sky, watching Jay’s reflection there instead. He looks cute when he sleeps, with his cupid’s bow lips parted and his constant tension drained away.</p><p>So he’s getting weird about Jay again, maybe. He wants to convince Jay to get half-naked in the pool with him, if nothing else. Maybe this will be a practice run for his flirting skills, he thinks, not really listening as Jay goes on and on about some rare record he’s thinking of buying from a vendor with a big setup of turntables and old LPs.</p><p>“Let’s go swimming,” Mike says when they’re on the way back up to their room with the record and some old VHS tapes Jay also purchased. </p><p>“What are you, six years old?” Jay asks. “A hotel pool is not that exciting.”</p><p>“I bet some comic con hotties will be there.”</p><p>“Ew, like those kids from the elevator?”  </p><p>“C’mon, Jay, live a little.”</p><p>“I’m way too full to go swimming. You go, I’ll just chill in the room.”</p><p>“No way, unacceptable! Chilling in the room is all you do at home. With your-- Your records, and your movies, and your old fucking magazines, same as ever. This is the big city, man. Comic cons are happening! Let’s do something dangerous, like swimming just fifty minutes after eating.” </p><p>“It hasn’t been that long. Has it?”</p><p>“Jaaaaayy--”</p><p>“Okay, fine! Jesus. I’ll come with you, but I’m just going to sit in the hot tub.”</p><p>“Mhm, all right. An acceptable compromise.”</p><p>Mike gives Jay the old swim trunks that Mike brought on this trip expressly for Jay’s use. Jay makes a face at them, but disappears into the bathroom to put them on. Mike dresses in his slightly bigger ones while Jay is in there, and wonders what Jay would say if he ever got a peek at Mike’s dick. It’s kind of weird that it hasn’t happened in ten years of friendship, really. Mike has only ever seen Jay shirtless a handful of times, and not at all since Jay got chubby. </p><p>He’s stupidly excited as they head down to the pool together, both still a little drunk. Mike feels pleasantly tipsy and ready for anything. He can tell Jay is in the same state because of how hard he’s laughing at the dumb jokes Mike is whispering into his ear as they make their way through the comic con crowd, commenting on costumes as they go. </p><p>“What the hell is that thing?” Mike asks, pointing when they’re almost to the pool. “Is that a fucking-- Is that the fucking garbage heap from Fraggle Rock??”</p><p>“No-- Stop--!” Jay says, almost laughing too hard to drag Mike’s pointing finger down and make them less conspicuous. “I dunno what that is,” he says, still holding Mike’s wrist, giggling. “But it’s not the Trash Heap. The character’s name was Trash Heap, okay, Mike? Not garbage.”</p><p>“Sorry, you’re obviously the superior Fraggle Rock scholar. Hey, Jay, you want to buy a badge and go get Lou Ferringo’s autograph?”</p><p>Jay cracks up and sort of falls through the door of the indoor pool area, Mike following him close and grinning, enjoying himself already. Jay was right, this is going to be great, though not because of anything Vintage Con-related. The pool is indeed crowded with comic con people, most who are in regular bathing suits but a few who are decked out in costumes and taking pictures near the windows that look out on the airport area.</p><p>“Ugh, the jacuzzi is crowded,” Jay says, eying it as they grab towels and make their way over. </p><p>“So what?” Mike says. “We’ll elbow those brats out of the way.”</p><p>Jay takes his shirt off when they’re near the hot tub and avoids Mike’s eyes, adjusting the waistband on the swim trunks, which are big on him, held in place by a drawstring. Mike follows suit and checks to see if Jay is looking at his exposed chest, but he’s just lingering near the hot tub and looking nervous about what his point of entry should be. </p><p>“All right, folks, make way,” Mike says, stepping into it and hissing at the water temperature when it’s only up past his ankle on the first tiled step. As he predicted, a few of the ladies in the hot tub depart as he whittles out a space for himself and Jay near the stairs. A couple of young women also stay, and so do the three guys who are either with them or trying to hit on them. </p><p>Jay settles at Mike’s side, squirming when their thighs touch on the seat under the water. The bubbles are going, roiling the water around madly, and everything below the surface is obscured. </p><p>“So,” Mike says, stretching his arms out along the rim of the tub so that one of the nearby guys moves a little farther from him. Jay stays in place but sinks a little deeper, so that his shoulders aren’t touching Mike’s arm and his chest is completely submerged. “You guys here for comic con?” Mike asks, nodding to the others.</p><p>“Yeah,” one of the girls says. “Isn’t everybody?”</p><p>“Oh sure,” Mike says, before Jay can reply. “Me and Jerry here are big Trek fans, personally. I’m Mike, by the way.”</p><p>Jay gives him a look like, you get to use your preferred name but I don’t? Mike winks at him. The other people in the tub introduce themselves in an awkward procession. Mike says it’s nice to meet them and instantly forgets all their names. </p><p>“Are you guys going to the Ten Forward party tonight?” one of the girls asks. “Since you’re Trek fans?”</p><p>“Of course,” Mike says, perking up at the sound of that. “Remind me where it is?”</p><p>“It’s in that hotel lobby bar,” she says. “It looks kinda futuristic, you know?”</p><p>“Sure does,” Mike says, and he turns to grin at Jay, who looks mopey. Mike redirects his grin at the girl whose name he can’t remember. She’s chubby with a sweet face and an upturned nose, freckles. </p><p>“I’ll be there in my original series uniform,” she says. </p><p>“I hope you have the go-go boots and everything,” Mike says. </p><p>“Of course, yeah!” </p><p>There’s definitely some flirting going on, and Mike would feel better about it if Jay wasn’t sitting beside him in silence. Jay is actually way more charming and likeable than Mike, but he doesn’t show it to the right people, only really to Mike and a few others who’ve known him forever. </p><p>“Is there any horror fandom stuff happening?” Mike asks, for Jay’s benefit. “We like that, too.”</p><p>Jay snorts, almost inaudibly. </p><p>“The Evil Dead panel,” one of the guys said. “Better get in line early for that, though.”</p><p>“Wait, what?” Jay says, perking up. </p><p>“The panel with the Evil Dead cast. Bruce Campbell and everyone--”</p><p>“Holy shit,” Jay says, stirring into an upright posture at Mike’s side. “Is Sam Raimi here?”</p><p>“Oh god no,” the guy says. “I wish. That’d be amazing.” </p><p>“Bruce Campbell is great though,” Jay says, and he turns to Mike, looking starry-eyed. “We have to go to that, okay? Wait-- When is it?”</p><p>“Tomorrow at two,” the guy says.</p><p>“Fuck,” Jay says, wilting. “We have to work.”</p><p>“Oh nooo,” the cute girl says. “You have to work during the con? That sucks.”</p><p>“Just from noon to five tomorrow,” Mike says. “And I can cover for you, man,” he says, elbowing Jay. “You can go to the thing. I’ll hold down the fort.”</p><p>“Seriously?” Jay grins. “Thanks, that’d be. Uh, yeah.” </p><p>“I could hold a place for you in line,” the guy says, and Mike zeroes in on him as a potential irritant when he notices that he’s relatively good-looking, if also too skinny with some acne scars on his cheeks. Mike tries to remember his name-- Tim? Tom?</p><p>“You don’t have to,” Jay says, stiffening.</p><p>“Well, it’s just-- Most people are gonna start lining up at noon, if not earlier. If you try to get in at two, it’ll be full.” </p><p>“Dammit,” Jay says, fidgeting. “Maybe I’ll take you up on holding a spot for me, then.” </p><p>“Cool,” the guy says. “You’re a big Evil Dead fan?”</p><p>Jay launches into a monologue about seeing the movie as a kid and getting obsessed with it and going to film school because of it, really. This leads to him and the guy, whose name Mike still can’t recall, getting into a serious discussion about filmmaking while Mike goes to swim in the big pool with the girls, finally too hot to stand the sweltering jacuzzi water any longer.</p><p>“Remind me your friend’s name?” Mike says when he’s treading water in the deep end with the cute girl, whose name is Marley, which is adorable like the rest of her. Still, Mike can’t stop eying Jay and that guy in the hot tub, ‘cause what the fuck?</p><p>“Oh, that’s Travis,” Marley says. “We went to high school together.”</p><p>“How, uh. Old are you, may I ask?”</p><p>She laughs at that and confirms she’s twenty-five, which would have been Mike’s guess and is a relief. They flirt in the pool for a while, until one of her friends tells her it’s almost time for some panel they want to attend. </p><p>“It’s about The Walking Dead,” Marley explains, swimming backward toward her friend. “Do you watch it?”</p><p>“Nope,” Mike says. Jay has told him it’s like a soap opera with zombies. “I guess I’ll see you later at the bar,” he says.</p><p>“Yeah! The Trek party starts at eight. Bye for now!”</p><p>Mike waves to them and swims toward the edge of the pool, hefting himself out and heading for the hot tub. Maybe Jay wants to be rescued from his conversation with this nerd. He’s way too polite, really. </p><p>Mike looms over them, feeling enormous. They’re talking about some horror movie or maybe TV show that Mike has never heard of. Jay turns to look up at him, then Travis does, too. Mike wishes he’d wrapped a towel around himself before approaching, but too late now.</p><p>“Your friend just left,” Mike says, speaking to Travis and pointing at the door back into the hotel with his thumb.</p><p>“Oh, they were going to that Walking Dead panel.” Travis shrugs and makes a face, looking at Jay again. “I’m not really into it.”</p><p>“Me either,” Jay says, looking thrilled to hear this in a way that pisses Mike off. “The first episode was brilliant, but--”</p><p>“Yeah, it was like a mini movie, I was excited at first.”</p><p>“Yes, exactly! And then, ugh, it’s like, all this slow drama--”</p><p>“I know, it got so boring. Marley likes it because she thinks Norman Reedus is hot, which is fucked up.”</p><p>Jay laughs hard. Mike doesn’t even know who Norman Reedus is. He feels like an idiot, standing over them and dripping.</p><p>“I’m going back to the room,” he says to Jay. “You coming?”</p><p>“Oh-- Sure--”</p><p>“You don’t have to,” Mike says when Jay stands and climbs out of the hot tub.</p><p>“It’s okay, I’m getting too hot anyway.”</p><p>Mike snorts. Jay gives him a look like, what’s your problem?</p><p>“See you guys later,” Travis says, lifting his hand. “I don’t really care about Trek, but I’ll probably go to that Ten Forward party with them.” </p><p>“Cool,” Jay says. “I’m not actually into Trek either. Mike was just giving me a hard time.”</p><p>Travis looks back and forth between Jay and Mike, who has fetched their towels and is handing Jay’s over. </p><p>“Are you guys--?” Travis asks, pointing his finger at Mike and then at Jay, eyebrows lifting. </p><p>“Are we what,” Mike says, afraid he knows what the question will be, and why.</p><p>“Uhh, like--”</p><p>“Oh god no!” Jay says, laughing. He’s red-faced, too, maybe still from the hot water. “We’re not-- No. We’re just co-workers. And friends,” he adds, giving Mike an apologetic look for forgetting that part in the heat of his pre-hookup moment. Or whatever this is, for him. </p><p>Mike should have known this would happen when Jay let himself out into the real world. His usual routine is work, the bar with Mike, then home to the cozy cave of his apartment. Sometimes they go to film screenings or festivals with their group of old friends from school who ended up in Milwaukee. Jay isolates himself from even the potential of getting laid, normally. Now he’s been set loose and he’s like fresh blood in the water to these horror-savvy nerds.</p><p>“What’s wrong?” Jay asks, poking Mike’s arm in the elevator when he’s been silent all the way up, pressed against Jay again since the thing is packed with costumed comic con people who are loud and annoying. </p><p>“Nothing,” Mike says. “I just need a nap.” </p><p>“Aww,” Jay says, laughing. “Yeah, that sounds good. We can ask for a wake-up call at five-thirty, so we won’t miss the cocktail thing and our free drink tickets.”</p><p>“You’re in a good mood suddenly.”</p><p>“Am I?” Jay turns from Mike and grins at nothing in particular. “Yeah, maybe. I can’t believe Bruce Campbell is here. Which hotel do you think he’s staying in?”</p><p>“Why, you want to try to sleep with him?”</p><p>“What the fuck?” Jay says, loud enough that several people wearing demon costumes with yellow horns turn toward them and then snicker when they turn away. </p><p>The elevator doors open and Mike shoulders his way past swords and wings to get the fuck out, feeling like he almost can’t breathe. Jay follows, and he still looks annoyed by that comment when Mike is unlocking the door. </p><p>Jay doesn’t say anything about Mike’s shitty attitude, just goes into the bathroom to shower off the pool smell. Mike doesn’t mind smelling like chlorine. He pulls off his clothes and puts on clean boxers and a t-shirt before climbing into bed for a nap. Jay can order the wake up call if he wants. Mike just wants to sleep off his fading day drunk. Maybe he’ll sleep with that Marley girl later, if she’s into it. He’s had sex with a woman who was wearing an original series Trek dress and go-go boots before, but it’s been like fifteen years, and he could stand to do it again.</p><p>Despite how tired he is, Mike has trouble getting to sleep. He listens to the subtle Jay movements from the bathroom and then when he’s back in the room. Mike has the comforter pulled up over his ear and he's turned toward the wall, away from Jay’s bed, which is closer to the window. There are fabric rustling sounds. Jay sighs twice. He picks up the room’s phone very quietly and uses a soft voice to ask for a wake up call at five-thirty, please, thank you.</p><p>Then there’s the sound of the blankets being moved aside, Jay climbing under them. He sighs again, then he’s quiet. Mike can’t hear him breathing over the rush of the room’s powerful air conditioning, which Mike cranked up before getting into bed. </p><p>Oh no, Mike thinks, as he’s falling over the edge of consciousness, toward sleep. He thinks about how he used to sneak into Jay’s dorm room to put that Cotton Eye Joe CD into his stereo so the song would blare according to the alarm Jay had set to get him up for class. It was as easy as charming Jay’s roommate into letting him in. Mike pretended to dislike Jay, because the roommate thought Jay was an embarrassing little hick. Mike actually hated Jay’s roommate, and later played a savage prank on him with Jay’s help, which involved hiding in the closet in their room and pretending to be a ghost. Jay laughed so hard at the guy’s terrified reaction, which they also secretly filmed. They never uploaded the video anywhere, but Jay probably still has it on his computer somewhere. The whole floor woke up to the guy screaming about ghosts, and Jay and Mike told the story over and over that semester, until Jay was at least ten levels cooler in everyone’s eyes, at Mike’s side.</p><p>Mike falls asleep and dreams he’s in the closet at Jay’s apartment, watching Jay in bed through the slats in the door. He’s breathing hard, feeling like a slasher in one of those stupid old movies Jay loves. Jay is tossing and turning in bed, and then whining softly, panting, and when Mike realizes Jay isn’t alone in bed he tries to shove the closet door open, only to find he’s locked inside. He calls Jay’s name, but Jay can’t hear him and doesn’t care, because he’s having a good time, lifting his legs up around some skinny guy’s sides and getting fucked hard, moaning like he loves it. </p><p>Mike wakes up with a throbbing erection and is relieved to see Jay is still asleep. It’s twelve minutes before their scheduled wake up call, which is probably enough time for Mike to beat off in the bathroom. He feels weird about it as he makes his way there in awkward steps, and he puts the shower on to camouflage the noise, then figures he might as well wash up while he’s at it. </p><p>Standing under the water, he tries to think about anything but his dream about Jay, which still feels too close and real to even be hot, whatever his dick feels about the matter. He thinks about the last guy he fucked, a million years ago in college. His memory of the guy’s face is pretty indistinct, and he mostly remembers feeling depressed after it was over, like he’d never been more alone in the world in some strange way, because there was nobody he could tell about it. He’d wanted to tell Jay, but Jay was in Milwaukee and still mad at him for not dropping out of college when Jay did, because they were going to say fuck it to film school and just make weird movies together. Mike was finishing his junior year when they made the pact, and as the summer that followed progressed and their plans to shoot things together didn’t amount to much, he gradually realized how stupid it would be to not finish his degree. He chickened out, basically. Jay still holds it over his head sometimes, and Mike has never lashed back at him by saying he knows Jay has a chip on his shoulder about not finishing school, but he could, if he ever really wanted to wreck things.</p><p>He’s still hard but nowhere near close to coming. He sighs and decides that for time management purposes he might as well just think about Jay. </p><p>He licks his lips and thinks about Jay’s soft, pale chest. The chubbiness makes him look so much more vulnerable than his skinniness did back in college. Mike is fucking into it, and he bites his bottom lip, lets his head fall back and eyes close as his hand moves faster on his dick. He wants to bite Jay and make him cry. He’s almost certain no one has ever fucked Jay before. Jay would be so astonished by the feeling, and clingy. Maybe he’d hide his burning face against Mike’s throat and whimper Mike’s name out pathetically while he took it. His short legs would be pressed so tight against Mike’s sides, shaking. Those fat pink lips would get all puffy and slick after Mike bit them, licked them, sucked them into his mouth, and jesus christ they’d look good stretched open wide around Mike’s cock, with Jay’s eyes all muggy and stupid for how much he’d love getting face fucked by a big dick, lashes fluttering while he tried to hold Mike’s merciless gaze like a good boy--</p><p>Mike comes hard and punches the wall of the shower rather than groaning, his teeth digging into his bottom lip.  </p><p>He gets his mind back in order while watching his come wash down the drain, his chest heaving. He’s not going to get into this bad habit again. It’s just his possessive streak. Jay flirting with that guy. Whatever, whatever. He’s weathered worse fantasies. </p><p>Back out in the bedroom, Jay is awake and dressed, sitting on the end of his bed and looking at his phone. He glances up at Mike and blinks innocently in a way that makes Mike’s ears burn. Mike is back in his t-shirt and boxers, toweled off. He puts on his jeans while Jay stares at his phone.</p><p>“Ready for more booze?” Jay says, in a peacemaking tone that means he’s no longer mad about Mike’s dumb comment and grouchiness in the elevator.</p><p>“Yep,” Mike says, also feeling lighter. Maybe he just needed to blow a load. Now he can concentrate on having a fun evening, some pressure relieved. “Guess we’ll have to mingle with repairmen while we drink it, though.”</p><p>“Nah,” Jay says. “We can stand in the corner like assholes and make mean comments about everybody under our breath.”</p><p>Mike grins, and Jay smiles back at him. That type of behavior is indeed their default, and absolutely nothing sounds better to Mike right now. </p><p>Mike hums Cotton Eye Joe under his breath on the elevator ride down toward the cocktail reception. Jay laughs and doesn’t look at him. As soon as they exit together they’re in comic con madness, the lobby crowded with costumes and general exuberance, dorks shrieking with joy all over the place. It’s infectious and entertaining, and they dawdle a little before heading for the secluded banquet room where the Vintage Con cocktail party is being hosted, a security guard posted at the door to keep the cosplayers out.  </p><p>“I’ll have a beer,” Mike says when they’re at the bar at the back of the room. “And Jerry here will have a rum and Coke.” </p><p>Jay doesn’t object to Mike ordering for him or using the name that's printed on his badge. They exchange one ticket for each drink and find a suitable corner to lean in while they consume them. They’re both wearing a short-sleeved button-up over their usual t-shirts, and maybe Jay put his on with getting laid later in mind, same as Mike. </p><p>Mike can deal with it, if so. He elbows Jay and nods to an old guy with a hand puppet who’s going around entertaining or possibly just annoying the crowd.</p><p>“Does he work for the hotel?” Mike asks. “Or is he just letting loose with his puppet friend while he’s on the road for work?”</p><p>Jay almost spits out his drink, laughing, then holds his hand over his mouth.</p><p>“How dare you,” Jay says when he can talk again. “That’s his wife.”</p><p>Mike doubles over laughing. Jay looks very pleased when Mike straightens up to look at him again. </p><p>“Seriously though,” Mike says. “Are we the youngest ones here?”</p><p>“Yeah,” Jay says, craning his neck to scan the crowd. “And I only see two women. And they’re both elderly.”</p><p>If Mike was in a meaner mood, he’d ask why Jay cares about women being here or not. He plugs his mouth with his beer bottle and chugs the rest down.</p><p>They finish a second round and ditch the cocktail party without getting accosted by the puppet guy. Jay says they really should have found out his story, but he doesn’t mean it. He’s drunk after two rum and Cokes, which was Mike’s plan. The two beers Mike drank barely made a dent, and he’s enjoying himself with the low level buzz and Jay bumping into him as they move through the comic con crowd, posing for phone pictures with every character they recognize. </p><p>It’s almost eight o’clock, and Mike thinks they should both eat something before they turn up to the Ten Forward party. They try to go to the restaurant Jay had in mind, but there’s a line of costumed people stretching out the door and a two hour wait for a table, the bar packed three people deep on every side. They check two other nearby sit-down places that are in the same state and end up getting hot dogs from a place that’s unpromisingly named CHICAGO STYLE in a food court area near the entrance to the airport’s south terminal.</p><p>“Do you still want to go to that party?” Jay asks when they’re throwing out their fast food garbage. “The, uhh. Star Trek thing?”</p><p>“Do you?” Mike asks, not really sure if he wants to pursue his flirtation with that group of people if it means Jay will do the same. </p><p>“Sure,” Jay says, shrugging. “It’s better than Vintage Con karaoke.” </p><p>Comic con employees are checking badges at the entrance to the hotel bar that’s been “transformed” into Ten Forward in the sense that a dozen or so people in the crowd inside are in Trek uniforms from various iterations of the show. Mike scouts the area for a way to sneak in and spots a side door that leads in from outside, seemingly unguarded. They double back and enter that way, giving each other a subtle high five after they’ve successfully installed themselves amid the crowd. </p><p>“Another rum and Coke?” Mike asks, and before Jay can answer he spots Marley waving to them. Mike feels his spirits dipping when he sees that Travis guy at her side. He tells himself to get over it, that it’s good that Jay is trying to get some dick, because it’s about time he let himself go for it, and maybe he feels safe here, with his JERRY name tag and Mike at his side, everyone dressed in crazy costumes. Also, Marley looks hot in her short original series dress and go-go boots. It’ll be fun, Mike thinks, following Jay toward them. So lighten up, dickhead.</p><p>Booze helps, as always, and so does the fact that “Bennie and the Jets” comes on overhead after Mike has finished two more drinks and has Marley sitting half in his lap in the couch area that their little group has claimed. She laughs when Mike sings along, and it’s almost cute enough to distract Mike from the fact that Jay went out onto the bar’s patio with Travis so they could hear each other talking over the increasingly wild crowd inside. </p><p>“I gotta keep an eye on my friend,” Mike says when he’s trashed, speaking directly into Marley’s ear. He’s got her purple lipstick on his mouth and his hand pushed up into her dress, just under the skirt, gripping her thigh. </p><p>“What friend?” Marley asks. “Jerry?”</p><p>“Uh-huh. He’s, uhhh. A hayseed, I dunno, s’hard to explain. Is your friend gonna be okay to him or what, do you think?”</p><p>“Travis? I don’t know, he was hoping Jerry’s gay, is he?”</p><p>Mike laughs in a way that almost turns into a burp, but he manages to rein it in. </p><p>“Good question!” </p><p>“Travis is nice, don’t worry!” Marley says, petting Mike’s face. “I’ve known him for a long time, before high school, even. He came to my Pokemon-themed birthday party.”</p><p>“I’m too old for Pokemon,” Mike says, with such sincere mournfulness that she laughs hard before kissing him again. </p><p>Later things get muddled. Mike moves through crowd after crowd of comic con people, pointing out things he knows and asking questions about things he doesn’t recognize, which Marley explains to him while holding his hand, her words evaporating instantly as Mike nods along like he’s listening, barely able to hear her over the crowd noise anyway. He ends up in a hotel room that is not his own, on his back in a bed that looks just like the one in his room, which he comments upon multiple times while Marley straddles him and giggles, maybe trying to fuck him but not getting too far with Mike currently too inebriated to manage more than a half hard-on. </p><p>“Sorry, I shouldn’a beat off earlier,” he says, slurring and sliding toward sleep. Someone else is in the room, rooting around in a suitcase on the floor and whispering apologies before darting out again. Marley is drifting to sleep with her head on Mike’s shoulder, her leg slung across his hips. She’s got great legs, short and perfectly squeezable in the thigh area. Mike thinks of Jay and hopes he’s okay. He should get up and rescue him, probably. He’ll just take a little nap first.</p><p>When he wakes up it’s pitch dark and he can hear people making out in the other double bed, under the blankets. He sits up with alarm, thinking it might be Jay over there, but then he hears a girl’s high-pitched squeaks and the low rumbling moan of a guy who definitely isn’t Jay, so, okay: not him. </p><p>“I gotta go,” he says, whispering this to Marley. </p><p>“Ngh,” she says, pawing at him. “G’night.”</p><p>“Your friends are, uh. That’s kinda rude, you want to come with me?” </p><p>“Guys, shut up!” Marley says, and the makeout dissolves into laughter in the other bed. </p><p>Mike decides this is just not his scene altogether and pats Marley’s shoulder before climbing out of bed. The girl in the other bed sighs and that side of the room goes quiet as Mike sneaks away, though he’s not sure why he’s sneaking. </p><p>He’s still drunk, blinking in the light outside the room. Also his fly is undone, but that’s corrected easily enough. He makes for the bank of elevators and feels proud of himself for remembering both which floor they’re staying on and the room number. There’s a moment when he’s terrified that he’s lost his wallet and the room key along with it, but then he finds it in the wrong pocket, which happens sometimes when he’s drinking.</p><p>He lets himself in expecting to find the room empty or Jay sitting up talking with Travis, who is apparently his long lost soulmate. Jay is there alone, watching TV with the blankets on the bed pulled up to his chin, his eyelids heavy but cracked open as Mike walks in. </p><p>“Hey,” Mike says, wiping at his face when he remembers Marley’s purple lipstick. “You’re awake.”</p><p>“Kinda,” Jay says. His voice is weird, small. </p><p>Mike glances at the digital clock on the table between their beds. It’s half past four in the morning.</p><p>“Jesus,” Mike says, swaying on his feet. “I’m gonna feel this shit in a few hours.”</p><p>“What-- From drinking? I didn’t have that much, after the cocktail thing.” </p><p>“Really? Oh. You okay?”</p><p>“Uh-huh.”</p><p>Jay shifts his eyes back to the TV. Mike gets the feeling he’s not okay but doesn’t press it. He goes into the bathroom and pulls the plastic wrapping off of one of the glasses beside the sink before filling it with water. He gulps some down, blinks at his grim reflection and returns to the room. </p><p>The lamp on the table between the two beds is on, and Mike wonders if that’s negotiable. He kicks off his shoes, pulls off his socks and jeans and climbs into bed with a groan. Jay is watching reruns of Grey’s Anatomy, apparently. Not a great sign. </p><p>“Did you have sex with that girl?” Jay asks when Mike stares listlessly at the television, trying to stay awake for Jay’s sake.</p><p>“Not really,” Mike says. “I overdid it on the beers. Used to be able to fuck when I was blackout drunk. Maybe I still can. I guess I’m tired--”</p><p>“Can I tell you something weird?”</p><p>“Um. Sure.”</p><p>“Are you still drunk?”</p><p>“I think-- Yeah.”</p><p>“Okay. Well. You know that Travis guy, from the hot tub?”</p><p>“Yes. You were-- Yes.”</p><p>Jay has the blankets pulled up to his bottom lip, and he sinks deeper underneath them, looking at the television. </p><p>“I sucked his dick,” Jay says, muttering this into the blankets. </p><p>“Oh,” Mike says. This must be a dream.</p><p>“Also I’m gay.”</p><p>Mike feels like he should make some grand gesture, like maybe getting in bed with Jay and holding him or something. But that would be insane, probably. </p><p>“That’s cool,” Mike says. </p><p>“I know you thought so already. And I don’t like it when you’re right because you’re always smug about it, so I didn’t want to tell you. But, tonight. I wanted to say it out loud, to you.”</p><p>“Because, you. Liked what you did tonight, or--?”</p><p>“It was okay. But I definitely-- Am. So.”</p><p>“Is he, uh. Was he nice about it?”</p><p>“Oh my god. What?”</p><p>“Did he reciprocate like a gentleman?”</p><p>Jay snickers and pulls the blankets up over his head entirely. </p><p>Mike wishes he could find it funny, too. His stomach hurts. On TV, the Grey’s Anatomy episode is playing a corny song over a weepy montage. </p><p>“Can I turn this off?” Mike asks. “I gotta go to sleep if we’re gonna be at that table by noon.”</p><p>“Yeah.” Jay pulls the blankets back down, grabs the remote and flicks off the TV, then the lamp, throwing the room into pitch black. “Goodnight,” he says, shuffling around in his bed.</p><p>Mike wants to say I love you in reply, which isn’t a great feeling.</p><p>Despite his inner turmoil, Mike is almost instantly asleep. He has weird dreams that make no sense and wakes to way too much brightness. Jay has pulled the curtains open and is shaking his shoulder. Mike’s head hurts, but not as badly as he feared. His heartache slams in hard when he remembers the night before, meanwhile. </p><p>“C’mon,” Jay says, no longer touching Mike now that he’s awake. “We gotta get moving, it’s almost eleven thirty and we still need to set everything up.”</p><p>“I’m coming,” Mike says, not moving. </p><p>He manages to get himself out of the bed and feels half alive by the time they’re downstairs in their Lightning Fast shirts, at their designated card table. The crowd in the vendor room is way too loud, the lights are too bright overhead, and the whole place feels airless in a way that’s making Mike anxious as he watches Jay flitting around the table, arranging the stickers he made and the VCR and old TV they brought with them, on which Jay plans to play a whole schedule of rare movies that can’t be found on DVD or online. Mike keeps a close eye on Jay, waiting for him to seem morose about what he did and divulged last night. He seems so chipper and unbothered that by one o’clock, after an hour spent miserably sipping water from a plastic bottle and wondering, Mike has to ask.</p><p>“Hey, uh,” Mike says, still staring out at the circulating crowd while Jay sits beside him. “Last night. Did last night happen?”</p><p>“I’m pretty sure it did,” Jay says. “Otherwise we’d have slipped out of linear time.” </p><p>“I mean--”</p><p>“I know what you mean,” Jay says, a little sharply. He looks over at Mike, blushing, and shrugs one shoulder. “Yeah,” he says, mumbling. “And that Evil Dead panel starts in an hour. Should I, umm. Last night he told me to find him in line, that he’d hold a spot for me. He said he’ll be wearing an Ash costume, with a chainsaw and fake blood on his face and everything.”</p><p>“God,” Mike says, sinking deeper into the well he sometimes feels like he’s peering up at Jay from within. “That guy’s way too skinny to be Ash. Also not tall enough,” he adds, though he’s not sure about the latter. </p><p>“Your friend Marley was gonna do his makeup,” Jay says, maybe pointedly. </p><p>“My friend?”</p><p>“The fake blood, I mean.”</p><p>“I knew what you meant-- What, what is happening? Are you going to meet up with him?”</p><p>“Well, uhh. I dunno. Should I?”</p><p>“Why are you asking me? Do you like him?”</p><p>Jay groans and puts his elbows on the card table, hands over his face.</p><p>“I dunno,” he says, mumbling. “He’s fine.” </p><p>“Jay--”</p><p>Mike isn’t sure where to go from there. Jay looks over at him, red-faced, one hand still pressed over his mouth. He looks cute. Mike feels awful in an over-familiar way. It’s heartsickness. His pulse is pounding. </p><p>“I mean, if you want to go see Bruce Campbell, you should go,” Mike says. “Nobody’s even coming up to the table here. I’ll be fine without you.”</p><p>Those words really don’t feel good, coming out of his mouth. Jay’s eyebrows go up a little.</p><p>“Yeah,” Jay says. “It’s like. What have I got to lose? He thinks my name is Jerry.”</p><p>“Your name is Jerry.”</p><p>“You know what I mean! Ugh, anyway. I’ll owe you one, for letting me do this.”</p><p>“Uhh, last time I checked I don’t get to dole your ass out to men or not.” </p><p>“What?” Jay says, so loudly that several passerby stop to stare. “That’s not-- What the hell are you talking about?”</p><p>“Never mind, it was a bad joke--”</p><p>“I meant for sitting at the table while I go to this panel! Jesus!”</p><p>“I know. You know what, just go. Go stand in line with skinny Ash and have fun. Why are you asking my permission anyway?”</p><p>“I’m not! I wanted your fucking advice, but now I’m not sure why.”</p><p>“Me either.”</p><p>Mike sits there scowling and watches Jay walk away. Some idiotic 80’s movie about the end of the world is playing on the little TV on their table, and the sound of it is eating at Mike’s soul in Jay’s absence. Jay loves this movie. Mike has attempted to watch it with him twice over the years, and he fell asleep both times. Maybe Mr. Wonderful who can take the whole weekend off to go to a comic con like a fucking child loves this movie, too, and maybe his youthful energy means he’d never fall asleep during a Jay screening. </p><p>Mike plays with his phone, not even attempting to make eye contact with the attendees who are passing by. Jay only handed out three stickers before he left, and the sight of them on the table, with that little cartoon representation of the two of them that Jay designed and had printed like a fucking tool, is enraging Mike at the moment. Why did Jay even tell him about the blow job thing? It’s like he wants Mike to get mad at him, or tell him not to go see that guy. What the fuck? </p><p>When Jay returns over an hour later he has Marley with him, and she’s wearing a somewhat ill-fitting R2-D2 dress that makes Mike embarrassed to be alive. Otherwise she looks pretty and happy to see Mike, chattering away with Jay as they make their way over to the table. </p><p>“Wow,” she says when Jay takes a seat beside Mike and neatens the stickers, though they haven’t been touched since he left. “I didn’t know you guys were here for work, too!” </p><p>“Well, now you know,” Mike says, not really in the mood to flirt. “How was Evil Dead?”</p><p>“Oh, it was great!” Marley says. “Bruce was hilarious. I’m really excited to see the new movie.”</p><p>“It’s just a remake, isn’t it?” Mike says, glancing at Jay. “We’re not really into those.”</p><p>Jay snorts and give Mike a look for speaking for him, or being rude, or both. </p><p>“Where’s your buddy?” Mike asks. </p><p>“My buddy?” Jay says, eyes narrowing. </p><p>“Travis went to a Dr. Who panel,” Marley says, understanding. She gives Mike a little smile like they’re conspirators in the Jay and Travis romance. “Jay was telling us you guys tried to go to Gibsons last night and it was too crowded. Our group has a big table reserved for tonight if you guys want to join us. It’s a six o’clock reservation.”</p><p>Mike is inclined to say that only old people eat dinner at six o’clock, but he decides to stop pointlessly being an asshole and ruining everyone’s good time, and nods instead, glancing at Jay.</p><p>“Yeah, that sounds good,” Mike says. “We were stuck with hot dogs for dinner last night.”</p><p>Marley heads back to the festivities and says she’ll see them for dinner, leaving her phone number with Mike.</p><p>“She likes you,” Jay says.</p><p>“No shit,” Mike says, and he winces when Jay gives him a wounded look. “Sorry.”</p><p>“You’re pissed that I went and did something fun while you were stuck here,” Jay says, maybe being deliberately obtuse. </p><p>“Not really,” Mike says.</p><p>“I could do the last hour here if you want to go--”</p><p>“No. I’m fine here.”</p><p>They sit in silence for a while after that, staring out at the thinning vendor room crowd. A few old dudes stop by to comment on the movie that’s playing and take stickers. Jay chats with them amicably while Mike sits in silence, feeling sorry for himself. </p><p>“Is this you two?” one old guys says, pointing to the cartoon figures on the sticker. </p><p>“Uh-huh,” Jay says, fidgeting. “Original artwork by me.” </p><p>The old guy holds the sticker up and looks back and forth between them, giving them a weird, leering smile.</p><p>“Yeah, it’s a good likeness of the two of you,” he says. “The scary one,” he says, pointing to Mike, who is glowering in a way that the sticker cartoon perhaps resembles. Then he points at Jay. “And the one with the teeth.”</p><p>“Hey, fuck off!” Mike says before he can stop himself.</p><p>“Mike!” Jay says, bright red. He turns back to the guy and forces a laugh. “No, that’s-- Exactly, uh. That’s me.” </p><p>“I didn’t mean no offense,” the old guy says, pocketing the sticker. “Maybe I’ll see you boys at the social event later.” </p><p>“Doubtful,” Mike says, still fuming. “Now scram.” </p><p>“Jesus!” Jay says when he old guy walks off laughing. “You can’t act like that with potential customers!”</p><p>“Since when? What the hell’s wrong with telling it like it is? That’s our brand. Look, there I am,” Mike says, pointing at the cartoon version of him with the angry, bent-in eyebrows. “I’m just playing to character.” </p><p>“You’re acting like a shithead. We have to do this again tomorrow, so don’t stay up till fucking five in the morning again, okay?”</p><p>“Uhh, hello? You did the same thing?” </p><p>“Yeah, but I can still act professional when I’m tired.”</p><p>Mike snorts and crosses his arms over his chest, looking away. He doesn’t want to do this fucking dinner at six o’clock or the vendor table again tomorrow or anything, suddenly.</p><p>Jay is silent for the rest of their shift at the table, and at five they pack things up together without speaking, stashing the stickers and old TV and VCR under the table for safekeeping.</p><p>“Let’s get a drink,” Mike says, regretting his surliness and wanting to make peace. “In fact-- Let’s get trashed before this fucking dinner with a bunch of people in their twenties. Let’s do shots!”</p><p>“Okay,” Jay says, to Mike’s surprise, and he smiles with what looks like relief. Mike wants to kiss his cheek. All his old Jay feelings are like a suit of debilitating armor that he took off years ago, and now it’s snapping back onto him one piece at a time like Iron Man’s suit, magnetized to his bones. </p><p>Though maybe that’s not how Iron Man’s suit works. Mike doesn’t fucking know about this shit, beyond the basics.</p><p>All he knows is that he wants to have fun with Jay, and that it feels good to sit close to him at the crowded hotel bar and throw back shots. Jay is snickering at Mike’s jokes like everything is fine again, and he doesn’t pull away when Mike’s shoulder bumps against his as the comic con attendees jostle around them, elbowing their way in to try to get the bartender’s attention. </p><p>“Remember in college,” Mike says, though he knows Jay remembers and just wants to tell the story again: “The first time you got drunk?”</p><p>“I remember parts of it,” Jay says, sounding a little drunk now. Mike wonders if he ate any lunch. Mike shoveled a dry bagel in his face shortly after they arrived at their vendor table and hasn’t had anything since. <br/>
  <br/>
“You were so funny,” Mike says. “Determined to finally get fucked up, and, like. Then you overdid it and I had to take care of you.”</p><p>Jay grunts and looks down into his empty shot glass.</p><p>“Yeah,” he says. “You taught me how to drink.”</p><p>“Oof, I did. Sorry.”</p><p>“Somebody else would have, eventually. I’m glad it was you.”</p><p>“Yeah, a true master of the art,” Mike says, not sure how to feel about where this conversation is going, or where he wanted it to go. “Anyway, that first time. You cried.”</p><p>“Yeah, yeah. I barely remember.”</p><p>“Hmm, well, I do. You were all clingy and sweet, too. Holding my hand! Where’s that Jay when you drink these days? You just laugh at everything, now.”</p><p>“You want me to cry, Mike?” </p><p>Jay has a look in his eyes that hits Mike low in his gut when their eyes meet. Mike isn’t sure how to interpret it. It’s not flirty, more like threatening. </p><p>“You know I like feeling needed,” Mike says, hearing how drunk he is as these words leave his mouth. “That’s all.” </p><p>“That’s all,” Jay mutters, and he signals for another round. </p><p>The next round arrives, and Mike decides, fuck it, let’s get really weird. </p><p>“Here’s to last night,” he says, lifting his shot glass to click it against Jay’s.</p><p>“Last night?” Jay says. </p><p>“You, uhhh. You--” Mike leans over to whisper in Jay’s ear. “Came out to me, finally.”</p><p>“Oh.” Jay rears away. It’s possible that Mike’s lips touched his ear. “Yeah, um. Cheers?”</p><p>Jay throws his shot back in one swallow, wincing. </p><p>“It seriously means a lot to me,” Mike says, resisting the urge to put his hand on Jay’s back-- Supportively, suggestively, whatever. Most people around them are decked out in superhero costumes, or what Mike presumes are anime costumes, and adding to the surreality of this moment is the fact that the bar is blaring “Party in the USA,” a disappointing downgrade from last night’s “Bennie and the Jets.” </p><p>“It meant a lot to me, too,” Jay says, shouting to be heard and not looking at Mike. </p><p>“You’re my best friend,” Mike says, almost weepy about it. </p><p>“No shit!” Jay smiles at him, and it’s such a relief, like a sunbeam pointed directly down into the well Mike resides in. “You’re drunk! C’mon, we should go meet those guys and eat something.”</p><p>The atmosphere of the bar has bled into the lobby of the hotel and even the driveway outside, where costumed attendees are smoking cigarettes in clumps, laughing loud and looking as drunk as Mike feels, which is not very, just enough to make everything seem swirled together in a charming way, one moment seeping easily into the next, until suddenly they’re in the steak restaurant’s crowded front lobby and Marley is throwing her arms around him. Only then does it occur to Mike that they never went up to the room to change and they’re both still in their Lightning Fast shirts. </p><p>Travis is also there, complaining to Jay that he had to scrub for half an hour to get all the fake blood off his face and that he should have just left it on. His acne-scarred cheeks are bright pink, maybe from the scrubbing, and Mike feels sorry for the guy as he watches him leaning close to Jay, hunching his shoulders and stammering awkwardly at moments. He’s not as cute as Mike remembered, and Jay seems awkward in a different way: polite, laughing insincerely, glancing at Mike when someone in the group says something dumb. </p><p>Mike wants to clap Travis on his skinny shoulder and tell him: do not fall in love with Jay! That way lies madness. </p><p>Then he remembers that Jay has sucked this guy’s probably skinny dick and feels no charity toward him for the remainder of the evening.</p><p>The dinner passes in a blur of shouted conversation. There are pitchers of beer and complimentary bread baskets, and Mike both eats and drinks a lot, also talks more than he normally does in groups of people he doesn’t know. Jay is at his side, snickering and packed in close at the crowded table, and Marley is on his other side, her shoulder settled against his. She’s not wearing the R2-D2 dress anymore, which is commendable, but in attempts to converse with her Mike can’t stop thinking about how she’s eight years younger than him and that like eighty percent of what she’s talking about is either completely alien to him or just dumb stuff he doesn’t like. </p><p>“You have to come to the rave with us tonight,” she says. </p><p>“I don’t really dance,” Mike says. “Or anyway, you wouldn’t want me to.”</p><p>“Yeah, I would. Jerry!” She reaches across Mike’s chest and taps Jay on the shoulder. “Will you guys come to this rave with us? It’s at the con, in the ballroom.”</p><p>“Sounds horrible,” Jay says, and Mike can’t help but guffaw. “Sorry. It’s not really my thing.” </p><p>“We should go to the game floor instead,” Travis says. “We can play Werewolf.”</p><p>“Oh god,” Mike says, having no idea what that is, and it feels physically good when Jay laughs under his breath, like a secret kiss pressed to Mike’s throat. </p><p>Settling the bill takes an eternity, and Mike ends up paying for both his and Jay’s meal to simplify things. They’ll be reimbursed from the same company account, anyway, when Mike turns in his receipts. By the time they’ve navigated this, he’s ready to be away from the mid-twenty-somethings in their geek culture wear, far from the prospect of their game floors and their raves. He taps Jay’s shoulder as they’re making their way back out into the crowded lobby area, noticing how close Travis is sticking to Jay’s side even as Marley seems to be getting the hint and drifting off with her girlfriends to visit one of the free-standing bars set up for the con. </p><p>“I’m gonna go up to the room and change out of this,” Mike says, tugging on the collar of his Lightning Fast shirt. He’s sweating underneath it, the heavy fabric making him feel boiling hot amid the close press of too many people in every area they move through. </p><p>“Okay,” Jay says. “I’ll come with you, I want to change, too.” </p><p>“We’ll see you later,” Mike says to Travis, back to feeling bad for the guy. But he’s young, and not bad-looking. He’ll get his dick sucked by others. </p><p>“Are you guys going to come to the game floor?” Travis asks, hovering back into their space as Mike moves away and Jay follows. “You might need my badge to get in.” </p><p>“I’ll text you,” Jay says, and then he’s waving and falling into step at Mike’s side, bumping against him as the crowd pushes them together. </p><p>“Are you really gonna text him?” Mike asks when they’re waiting for the elevators with approximately five hundred other comic con attendees. </p><p>“Eh,” Jay says. “He’s like twenty-six. It was getting old.”</p><p>“Yeah, you’re such a wise old man at thirty-one, you can’t relate.”</p><p>“You know what I mean!” Jay says, shoving him, and Mike nods, because he does.</p><p>The elevators are a lost cause and they end up taking the stairs to the twelfth floor, both out of breath and sweaty by the time they get there. In the room, Mike strips down to his boxer shorts while Jay sits on the end of his bed, pulling his Lightning Fast shirt off and glancing over at Mike like he’s not sure what’s happening, suddenly.</p><p>“I ate too much,” Mike says. “Want to go swimming?”</p><p>“Swimming after eating too much is generally not advisable.” </p><p>“I know, but do you? I’m also hot.” </p><p>To Mike’s surprise, Jay agrees to this plan and puts on Mike’s swim trunks again-- In the bathroom, Mike notes, not sure why he was expecting Jay to maybe change in front of him. Because Mike knows he’s gay now? That doesn’t make sense. Mike needs another beer, but first he wants to submerge himself in pool water and break the building fever that he’s felt coming on since he sat between Jay and Marley at that table in the restaurant. </p><p>They get lucky with the elevators on the way down to the pool and are able to pile into a crowded one with just enough room for the two of them to squeeze together in the front corner. </p><p>“Someone’s magic sword is poking me in the ass,” Mike says, whispering this into Jay’s ear to get a laugh out of him. It works, and they’re so close that Mike can feel it as well as hear it, the soft jiggle of Jay’s chest against Mike’s almost enough to arose him. If they weren’t crammed into an elevator car with two dozen shrieking cosplayers, he may have gotten a full on erection. </p><p>Jay is pink-cheeked and still sweaty at his temples, his eyes shining with just enough drunken glee to make him extra cheerful. Mike is staring down into them, noting that this is one of those perfectly-lit moments when they actually look green. He stares maybe for an incriminating amount of time, and before he can decide what to do about it the elevator doors open to the lobby at last, after stopping on every floor on the way down, and everyone tumbles out like a long-held breath that’s finally being expelled. </p><p>The pool is crowded and noisy, but Mike is feeling too happy to mind. He wades into the shallow end alongside Jay, letting himself look at Jay’s soft biceps and obsess silently over how the hair on Jay’s arms, chest and face is three different colors. </p><p>Everyone they run into in the pool seems to have a flask or thermos that they offer a drink from. Accepting every time is probably unwise, but Mike feels like they’re in some alternate dimension anyway, and they both partake of everything they’re offered, most of it sugary mixed drinks. They seem to have wandered into some kind of tiki-themed party that’s either sponsored by the comic con or happening spontaneously. Someone is blasting vintage tropical lounge music from a boombox, which they both find hilarious in the moment. </p><p>“Oh my god,” Jay says at one point, grabbing Mike’s arm when they’re standing near the ledge of the pool, the water hitting Mike mid-chest and Jay in up to his shoulders. “Look!” Jay says, squeezing Mike’s arm and pointing. “It’s the puppet guy, from yesterday!”</p><p>“Holy shit,” Mike says, turning, and he dissolves into snickering laughter when he sees that old man from the cocktail party walking around trying to mingle with the comic con kids. His puppet is now wearing what appears to be a miniature inflatable innertube and tiny sunglasses. “This is fucked,” Mike says, and Jay laughs so hard that his forehead knocks against Mike’s shoulder. “I mean in a good way,” Mike says, turning to look at him, grinning.</p><p>“I know,” Jay says, wiping tears of laughter from his eyes. “Oh my god. It’s perfect.”</p><p>Events blend together without attaching firmly to Mike’s memory as the evening progresses: they return to the room and put on dry clothes. Jay again changes in the bathroom. Then they’re back on the convention floor, drinking more, wandering around, taking blurry pictures with their phones and talking to random people at times but mostly to each other. At some point they end up in what might be the game floor, watching a group of people playing a game that involves sitting in a circle and accusing each other of murder, when a kid in a wizard robe runs in, wild-eyed and reeking of weed.</p><p>“Lightsaber duel on the roof!” he screams, while some hapless pizza delivery guy on the other side of the room continues to search for the Lindsey who asked to have her pizza delivered here, calling out her name over and over while holding the pizza over his head like a drowning man. </p><p>The wild-eyed kid runs around the room hollering about the lightsaber fight, telling people it’s happening right now, right now! Then he runs out of the room with his arms held over his head. </p><p>“We have to follow him,” Mike says, and Jay grins. </p><p>About a dozen other people have the same idea, and it turns into a kind of madcap chase down back hallways in the hotel, with the wizard robe kid shouting to follow him, this way, and everyone else in varying stages of drunken pursuit, laughing. </p><p>“He’s gonna lead us into the boiler room and murder us all!” Mike says gleefully at one point, and everyone laughs. Mike beams at Jay, proud of himself. </p><p>When they finally come to a door labeled ROOF ACCESS and Mike crashes through it along with the others only to see fifteen flights of stairs that lead to the top, he groans and hesitates while the younger people dash upward, unfazed.</p><p>“C’mon!” Jay says, pulling at Mike’s arm. “You can do it!”</p><p>“I’m not sure I want to see a lightsaber fight this badly,” Mike says, squinting upward, already out of breath from the run through the halls.</p><p>“The roof, though!” Jay says, tugging him onto the stairs. “It’ll be cool.” </p><p>Mike groans but obeys, ready to follow him anywhere. </p><p>Neither of them are in anything resembling good shape, and they’re both panting by the time they reach the top, the last two people to make it there. The door to the roof has been propped open with a cinderblock, and though it’s a warm night the air outside hits Mike with amazing relief, a hot wind blowing across the roof where three or four dozen people have gathered, possibly illegally, drinking from beer bottles and plastic cups as they watch two nerds with glowing fake lightsabers circling each other at the center of the roof. </p><p>“I’m gonna hurl,” Mike says, making his way over to the edge of the roof, which is ringed by a four foot tall wall. He braces his hands against it and breathes, staring down at the swarming crowd of comic con people below, then up at the airport in the distance, planes lifting off and coming down, the ones farthest out just lights blinking in the dark. </p><p>“This is the best view,” Jay says, leaning beside Mike at the wall, and only then does Mike remember that Jay is trashed. The fact that he’s still catching his breath makes him sound almost emotional, like he did that first time he got drunk, when he cried and said to Mike, why are you always so mean to me? </p><p>Mike already considered Jay his best friend at that point and was surprised by the accusation. He’d rubbed Jay’s shaky shoulders and told him he didn’t know, though as soon as he thought about it, he did. </p><p>“Hey,” Mike says, nudging his shoulder against Jay’s when they’ve been quiet for a while, watching the planes and the crowd down below rather than the plastic lightsabers that are smacking against each other behind them. </p><p>“Hey?” Jay says, turning to look at Mike. </p><p>“Are you, um. Are you okay, with everything?”</p><p>“With-- Everything?”</p><p>“I mean, do you need to talk, uh. ‘Cause you can talk to me, about things. And I won’t be a dickhead, or smug. I promise.”</p><p>“Oh.” Jay seems to understand what Mike is getting at and turns back to look at the sky, a plane coming in for a landing on the nearest tarmac. “Yeah, I. I’m okay, Mike.”</p><p>“Good.” Mike swallows a dry lump-like thing in his throat. Suddenly no one is appearing to offer them drinks from random flasks, but he’s probably had enough, anyway. </p><p>“I was thinking, you know-- I want to try to be a better person,” Jay says. </p><p>“Jesus, Jay, you’re like the best person I know.”</p><p>Jay snorts and look at him. </p><p>“You bake cookies and everything,” Mike says, not sure why he can’t come up with any better examples right now. </p><p>“Yeah, I probably need to do less of that,” Jay says, reaching down to touch his gut. “I don’t mean I need to be morally better or anything. I want to, like. Stop being such a self-pitying little shit. To stop wallowing. I sucked a guy off, Mike. That’s a big deal for me.”</p><p>“Um--”</p><p>“I mean ‘cause I was scared to, before, for a long time, but now I’ve done it and the world didn’t end. And I told you, and-- I dunno, I want this decade to be better than the last one. I want to try harder, at things. Maybe I’ll start going by Jerry.”</p><p>“Oh god, no!” Mike says, so distressed that Jay laughs. “How about J.J.?” </p><p>“No, ugh. I was kidding, anyway. About the name thing. Not about the other stuff.”</p><p>“Well.” Mike clears his throat and pushes his shoulder against Jay’s. “I’m here, uh.”</p><p>And so’s my dick! he wants to say, but it’s not the time, and that’s not what Jay means, anyway, or at least not entirely what he means. He can be newly unafraid of dicks and still not want to suck Mike’s.</p><p>“You know, we were laughing at that puppet guy,” Jay says, “But I fucking admire him. He was doing his own thing and having a great time, and he didn’t give a fuck what anyone thought. I guess I thought that was what I was doing, ‘cause I wear dorky clothes and I don’t date and I don’t have any fucking ambition, but all that is just me being a wimp. Like, so what if I try at stuff and I fail? At least I wouldn’t be stagnant.”</p><p>Mike feels distressed again, because it sounds like Jay wants to change his life in a big way, and Mike is the biggest part of Jay’s life. </p><p>“Just keep in mind that I can’t live without you,” Mike says. “And proceed accordingly.” </p><p>“Don’t worry,” Jay says, doing the small, jokey voice he puts on when he’s being sincere and he doesn’t want anyone to know, ironically giving it away every time. “You’re one thing I’m gonna keep.” </p><p>“Oh, what a relief.”</p><p>That sounded sarcastic, but Jay will probably know it wasn’t.</p><p>They stay up on the roof until they’re both feeling tired, not talking much and occasionally turning to watch the people on the roof rather than the ones down below. The crowd is thinning out, but the two guys with lightsabers are still going at it. Mike can’t see their wizard robe hype man, so maybe he’s gone back down to find another group of people to chase him up here. </p><p>“I need a real vacation,” Mike says when they’ve walked down three flights of stairs and found themselves on their floor, in some obscure corner, trying to track down their room. “I’ve enjoyed this nonsense way too much.” </p><p>“I had the same thought,” Jay says. He looks as pleased as he always does when their brains align. It’s important to him to feel understood, Mike has noticed, and he seems to experience it rarely, even with Mike, though maybe more so with him than others. “Maybe I’ll go out to L.A. again,” Jay says. “Maybe I’ll lose some weight first. That could be my inspiration. Like a goal or whatever.”</p><p>Jay yawns and steers Mike this way and that through the hotel’s quieting, winding hallways until they find their room at last and let themselves in. Mike flops face first onto the bed and listens while Jay washes up in the bathroom. He feels the curtain on some kind of opportunity slowly lowering, and sits up on his elbows with a start when he gets the sense that if he doesn’t act now, he’s not going to have another window for ten years, or maybe even twenty. Maybe he’s already a decade too late. It’s possible that he should have kissed Jay the morning after that first time he got drunk, when Jay was miserable and puffy-eyed, pretending to still be asleep after Mike woke up on the floor and poked his scrawny shoulder to check on him. </p><p>“You know I’ve fucked around with guys, right?” Mike says when they’re both tucked into their separate beds with the blankets pulled up to their chins, old episodes of Blind Date playing on cable.</p><p>“Ryan told me that once,” Jay says, still staring at the TV. “I wasn’t sure if it was true.”</p><p>“Well. It is.” </p><p>Mike rolls his eyes at the thought of Ryan, who was friends with one of the guys Mike fucked. Of course that guy told Ryan, who told Jay. And now Jay’s just lying over there acting like it’s no big deal.</p><p>Jay is quiet for a long time, but Mike can feel him fretting. It’s like the scent of a bonfire in the distance, a controlled burn that Mike wants to investigate but also a place where he probably isn’t welcome.</p><p>“I guess Ryan made it sound like some kind of experimental phase,” Jay says, doing the thing where he half-pulls the blankets over his mouth again. </p><p>“Yeah, I guess he’d know better than me,” Mike says, because what the fuck. </p><p>“I don’t mean-- What? I-- Ah. Why, just-- Jesus, I’m tired. Mike. Can we go to bed?”</p><p>“Uh-huh,” Mike says, already rolling over. “Gotta be well-rested for another day of sitting at that fucking table tomorrow.”</p><p>Which will be hell, but at least they won’t be alone together in the shop. Never mind, Mike thinks, glaring at the darkness after Jay snaps off the TV and the light. Never mind, never mind.</p><p>He expects Jay to say something else, something lame, even just ‘good night,’ but he’s silent and motionless in his bed, which feels like it’s on the other side of some enormous ocean that will always be there, between them. </p><p>Mike is physically and emotionally exhausted and falls asleep quickly. He sinks into an elaborate dream that seems way too real, about living in a post-apocalyptic world twenty years in the future, in a community that resides inside a giant, armored bunker that functions like a windowless city. In the dream, they’ve fun out of food, medicine, water, something, and are sending a team of armed scouts out to look for help.</p><p>Jay is one of them, and in the dream he looks like Kurt Russell, only still also Jay, muscular but still a little soft in his cheeks. He’s got longish hair that curls behind his ears and a full beard with a thick mustache that hides his upper lip, so that Mike doesn’t have to think about wanting to bite it every time they speak anymore, only he’s thinking it anyway. In the dream, he knows he’s been in love with Jay for so much longer than he ever even feared and that he’s done nothing about it but stay at Jay’s side through the end of the world and after, and now he can’t even do that anymore, because Jay is going out with the scouting party and Mike is staying behind.</p><p>“That’s ridiculous,” Mike says, peering down into Jay’s eyes, which are sharp and sad at the same time, weatherbeaten but still feisty. He looks like he’s ready for a fight. “I’ll come with you.”</p><p>“Excuse me?” Marley says, appearing behind him. Though Mike and Jay are twenty years older, she’s the same, except that her R2-D2 dress is ragged and unwashed. “You’re going to leave me here with our children and run away with him? I don’t think so.”</p><p>“Mike, you can’t,” Jay says, already backing away as the giant armored doors that the scouting team will depart through creak open behind him, exposing beams of harsh sunlight. “You have to stay here, you know that.”</p><p>“I don’t know anything,” Mike says, his voice breaking. “Stay here, then. If I have to stay--”</p><p>“I have to go,” Jay says, still backing away. “I can help.” </p><p>“But I need you,” Mike says, and he hears Marley scoff behind him. “Jay!”</p><p>“Mike, it’s over,” Jay says, looking so torn up about it that Mike steps toward him. Jay’s expression hardens, and he shakes his head. “We ran out of time.”</p><p>“No, Jay-- Wait--”</p><p>Jay turns his back on Mike and walks to a group of people who are standing near the opening doors, all of them carrying weapons. Jay has some kind of automatic gun strapped across his back, which makes Mike want to sink to his knees, because what happened? Jay hates violence, at least in real life.  </p><p>Mike stands watching, with Marley at his side, as the group walks out into the hateful wilderness outside. He knows they might not come back. He can’t breathe without Jay nearby, even if he was never as close as Mike wanted him.</p><p>“Now you see what happens,” Marley says. “Everybody gets what they paid for.”</p><p>Mike doesn’t know what she means. His heart lurches when the giant doors close again, Jay on the other side of them now. </p><p>The dream swirls toward deeper, darker horrors, time-skipping until the scouting group returns, half-eaten and contaminated by the zombie-like things outside. They’re pounding on the doors, begging to be let in. Nobody but Mike wants to allow it, and the others are holding him down, keeping him from reaching the lever that would open the doors. </p><p>Jay is out there with them, hurt and afraid. Mike can feel it, then can hear Jay’s pathetic cries from the other side of the door, and Mike has to help him, even if it ends what’s left of the world, but the others won’t let him, Jay will die out there, he’s in pain--</p><p>“Mike!”</p><p>Mike jerks in the grip of the people who are holding him down, but it’s just Jay, somehow, close to him the dark, trying to hold him still. He smells like a swimming pool and beer, also sweat. They’re in the hotel, in Chicago, by the airport. It was a dream, a nightmare.</p><p>“Jesus, are you okay?” Jay asks. He hasn’t put the light on and Mike can’t see him at all but can feel him, his shaking hand lifting to settle on Jay’s shoulder. Jay is warm and soft and sitting very close. “You were-- God. I didn’t know you have bad dreams like that.”</p><p>“I-- Don’t.” </p><p>“Too much steak, maybe,” Jay says, rubbing Mike’s shoulder. “Red meat always makes me have bad dreams. It’s so tasty, though. And I have bad dreams anyway, you know that.”</p><p>Jay is babbling nervously, clearly shaken by whatever panicked noises Mike was making in his sleep. Mike feels like the dream is right behind him, a well of bottomless horror that he might be dropped back into. His heart is slamming. Jay smells so good, and he doesn’t move away when Mike leans forward to press his face against the heat of Jay’s fuzzy cheek.</p><p>“Okay,” Jay says, softly, patting him. “You’re all right.”</p><p>“Jay,” Mike says, and then he’s rubbing his fingertips over Jay’s lips, to determine their location before he leans in to kiss them. </p><p>Jay sucks in his breath but doesn’t move away. His lips are parted and even softer than Mike thought they would be, fucking pillowy against the first cautious swipes of Mike’s tongue. Then they’re opening wider so Mike can press inside. </p><p>The room is a dark void around them, silent except for the hum of the air conditioning and the soft click of their lips as Jay kisses back. Mike feels like they’re outside of time and space, like this is every kiss they might have already had and every future one that now won’t be their first, every moment in time when they had this chance and didn’t take it, only now they are. </p><p>“Okay,” Jay whispers against Mike’s mouth, pressing one hand to Mike’s chest and pushing him back a bit. His other hand is cupped around Mike’s jaw, and his breath is choppy and hot against Mike’s lips. He moans when Mike tries for another kiss, and allows it for a moment, his tongue just peeking out to slide against Mike’s. “Okay,” he says again when he moves back, patting Mike’s chest as if to calm him down. “Okay, okay.”</p><p>“Jay,” Mike says, embarrassed when his voice breaks.</p><p>“It’s-- Mike, you’re barely awake--”</p><p>“No, I am, I am, c’mere--”</p><p>Jay lets Mike pull him into his arms and opens for his tongue again, sighing into the kiss and grabbing a handful of Mike’s puffy chest like it’s a boob that needs squeezing, which Mike supposes it is. It feels good, anyway, letting Jay get his greedy little hands on him, and Jay can squeeze him anywhere he wants. </p><p>“I don’t really know what I’m doing,” Jay says, whispering this like it’s a secret.</p><p>“Me either,” Mike says. </p><p>He doesn’t mean kissing, which is probably what Jay means. Mike has kissed a lot of people, and he knows he’s good at it. He kissed Marley for damn near an hour just yesterday. But that feels like a lifetime ago, suddenly, and he’s never kissed someone he loves like this, like he’s reordering the rules of the universe by finally doing it. </p><p>“Okay, well, then--” Jay says, moving away with more determination. “Just-- G’night.” </p><p>Then he’s slipping out of Mike’s arms and climbing back into the other bed. Mike squirms down under the blankets, feeling charged up all over and like he’s going to drop straight back into sleep anyway, his mind shooting in eighty different directions the way it does in a dream where nothing makes sense. </p><p>His lips are buzzing. He licks over them, already wanting the taste of Jay back. He has no words for it in his current state and probably wouldn’t come up with any even if he kissed Jay a thousand times in the light of day. It’s more of a feeling than a taste, like: as long as you always have this, everything will be okay.</p><p>Which is a terrifying prospect, because the flip side is that if he ever loses it he’ll never be okay again. </p><p>Mike sleeps, and if he dreams again he doesn’t remember it by the time he’s waking up to the sound of Jay’s phone alarm. </p><p>It’s early, nine-thirty, because the vendor hours start at ten-thirty today and end at three, so everyone can drive or fly home and make it back for dinner. Mike doesn’t want to go home or move from this bed. He’s frozen by a terror of facing this day and whatever comes after as he listens to Jay taking a leak in the bathroom and washing his hands. </p><p>“Hey,” Jay says, crossing the room toward his suitcase. “We should get going, um. We could get a real breakfast, if you want.”</p><p>“What’s real,” Mike asks, more generally than about breakfast.</p><p>Jay snorts. He doesn’t look upset when Mike dares to sit up and study his face. </p><p>“Eggs?” Jay says. “Waffles?”</p><p>“Eggs,” Mike repeats dumbly, feeling like an alien who just woke up in this body. Did they kiss last night? Did he travel back here from a dystopian future where Jay turned into a zombie because Mike waited too long to kiss him? “Waffles,” he says, staring at Jay.</p><p>“You okay?” Jay asks, freezing in mid-motion as he shrugs on his Lightning Fast shirt.</p><p>“Yes,” Mike says though it feels very far from true. He has morning wood and needs to take a piss. He’s extremely hungry, confused, and his nipples are hard under his t-shirt, which Jay can probably see. His gaze drops in that direction before flicking back up to Mike’s face.</p><p>“Okay,” Jay says, looking dazed, and Mike remembers him saying that last night, over and over, while gently pushing Mike away. </p><p>Down at the vendor room table, they sit beside each other in grim silence and stare out at the Vintage Con attendees as they mill about with to-go cups of coffee. There are fewer of them this morning, most of them the same old guy types as the day before. </p><p>“Did that guy text you?” Mike asks after a while, unable to resist.</p><p>“What guy?”</p><p>“The, uhh--” Mike can’t bring himself to say the name ‘Travis,’ because its very existence feels like a personal insult, but he also doesn’t want to say: the guy whose dick you sucked.</p><p>“Oh-- No,” Jay says, shaking his head. “I guess he got the hint.”</p><p>“Yeah,” Mike says, feeling punched, because that’s probably what he needs to do as well.</p><p>Jay is quiet during the rest of their vendor table shift, mostly talking to the people who approach, which for some reason is twice as many as the day before. Maybe the reason is Jay, Mike thinks, eying him in probably unsubtle ways. Jay makes people light up and feel important. Mike is too addicted to the feeling, too greedily inclined to think he’s special, that Jay doesn’t just make everyone feel this way, like they’ve got his full attention and he just wants to make them happy. Maybe that’s what the reciprocated kisses were about last night, if Mike didn’t just dream them up entirely. </p><p>They pack up at three, get their bags from the room and schlep everything to Mike’s car after checking out at the front desk. The comic con is still going strong, people in costumes posing for pictures out on the front driveway as Mike slowly inches from the parking garage and out onto the main road.</p><p>“Well, that was fun,” Jay says when they’re on the highway. </p><p>“The crowds were a little much,” Mike says, wondering if he should just bring up the kiss, because even if it was only a dream, Jay has the right to know that Mike wishes it wasn’t. </p><p>“Yeah,” Jay says. “It did get a little claustrophobic at times. But I think we got at least one or two new customers. I only gave away fifteen stickers, though.” </p><p>“How many do you have printed?”</p><p>“Uhh, well, two hundred was the lowest number you could print--”</p><p>“Jesus, Jay. Don’t forget to expense that shit.”</p><p>Jay gets quiet after that, and Mike feels bad for calling the stickers ‘that shit.’ He sighs and concentrates on driving. The Sunday afternoon traffic is bad coming into Milwaukee, and by the time they get to Jay’s apartment it’s past five o’clock.</p><p>“So, um,” Jay says when they’re parked in his lot, Mike waiting for him to gather his stuff and bolt. Jay is staring out the passenger side window. He’s taken his seatbelt off and is breathing kind of hard. “Do you want to come up?” he asks, looking stricken when he turns to Mike.</p><p>“For what?” Mike asks.</p><p>“Um, I think. For sex, we could have some kind of sex, you and me. If you want.”</p><p>Jay goes bright red and swallows audibly. He glances at the windshield, then back at Mike, looking like he’s waiting for Mike to be mean about this.</p><p>“We kissed,” Jay blurts when Mike just sits there, speechless with the effort to accept this is really happening. “Last night--”</p><p>“I know.”</p><p>“I wasn’t sure if you remembered.”</p><p>“I did-- I do-- Jay--”</p><p>“Just-- <i>mph</i>--”</p><p>Jay laughs against Mike’s mouth, maybe amused by the force of his kiss. As soon as Mike has his seatbelt scrabbled out of the way he’s pinning Jay to the passenger side door, sort of crawling onto him and plunging his tongue into Jay’s panting mouth.</p><p>“Jesus,” Jay says, his eyes all glassy and wide when Mike pulls back. “You-- We should go up, upstairs--”</p><p>“Yes,” Mike says. “Yes to sex.” </p><p>“Oh my god,” Jay says. He snickers and turns to open the door, tumbling out like his legs barely work. </p><p>They unload the car without speaking. Mike grabs his own bag, because if they fuck there’s no way he’s not spending the night here, with Jay in his arms. Jay’s face is blazing all the way up to his second floor place, and he drops his keys when he tries to unlock the door.</p><p>“Hey,” Mike says. “There’s no, like. Rush, if you want to talk, or--”</p><p>“Talk?” Jay says, looking distressed when he’s straightened up with his keys in hand. “No, god. I-- I told you. I want to stop being a wimp. You’ve fucked a guy before-- You said?”</p><p>“Uhhhh, yes. Several.”</p><p>“Well. Good. Show me, okay? I want to know how it feels.” </p><p>Jay unlocks the door like that’s that and walks inside. Mike follows, feeling bewitched, or like a camera crew is going to jump out and scream gotcha, yeah right, it was never going to be that easy, it was never going to happen at all!</p><p>They go into Jay’s bedroom and Jay takes his shirt off. Mike does the same, allowing Jay to observe the deer in the headlights expression that is surely on his face. </p><p>“You should know that I’m, like, in love with you,” Mike says, pronouncing this more like a skeptical question than he intended to. </p><p>“So?” Jay says, unbuttoning his pants, still so red-faced. </p><p>“Soo. You’re about to start a whole world of trouble for yourself if you think I’m gonna be cool about this.”</p><p>“Cool about this? You’ve never been cool about anything. C’mere.”</p><p>“Jay!”</p><p>“What? I’m not using you, of course-- Of course we love each other, like! That’s this whole thing.”</p><p>Mike opens his mouth to say more, then decides, fuck it, because suddenly Jay is naked, and he’s half-hard, with a bigger dick than Mike would have guessed, though still not, like, big.</p><p>Jay gets under the blankets on his neatly made bed, hiding his nudity. Mike flaunts his for a moment, watching the way Jay’s eyes travel over him, and the way he squirms under the blankets before dragging his gaze back up to Mike’s face. </p><p>“I could put some music on?” Jay says when Mike approaches the bed. </p><p>“Pro tip number one,” Mike says. “There’s no music during gay sex.”</p><p>“Oh my god,” Jay says, snickering and scooting toward the wall when Mike climbs into his bed. “I don’t believe you,” he says, staring up at Mike with red-faced wonder. </p><p>“I could sing,” Mike says. </p><p>“Not unless you want to kill my boner.” </p><p>“Mhmm, in that case.”</p><p>Mike sort of dumps himself onto Jay under the blankets. Jay gasps at the feeling of being buried underneath him and reaches up to toy with his hair. He’s really hard now, stiff and hot against Mike’s thigh as it settles in between his legs. </p><p>“You okay?” Mike asks, his lips hovering just over Jay’s. </p><p>“Uh-huh,” Jay says. </p><p>“‘Cause I’m lying naked on top of you and you’re asking me to fuck you--”</p><p>“Yep, I know all that.”</p><p>“--And it’s a little out of character. Should I be alarmed?”</p><p>“No.” Jay fidgets until his knee is touching Mike’s dick, and he bites his bottom lip, grinning. “This is the new me,” he says. “Taking what I want.”</p><p>“Oh, you’re taking it, huh?”</p><p>“Well--”</p><p>“I’m not giving it to you? You’re taking it?”</p><p>“Mike!” Jay says, and the way he says Mike’s name makes it impossible for Mike to wait another second longer to kiss him. </p><p>Mike feels calmer with the love confession out of the way. He’s also sure, however clumsily he articulates it, that Jay would never let someone touch his ass unless he loved them. So they’re batting a thousand in that department, or so Mike’s best friend from high school would say if he knew what was going on. </p><p>“Oh my god,” Jay says when Mike is still just using his fingers, sweating like crazy against Jay’s sweltering skin but not wanting to ask him to push the blankets away, because this is clearly Jay’s first time and he’s so tight around Mike’s probing fingers that Mike can barely make his voice work anyway. Jay has his hands pressed over his eyes, and he’s panting, open-mouthed, making Mike even more fond of the teeth, now that he’s seen them from this angle, in this circumstance. “Oh my god,” Jay says again, his voice pinching up when Mike strokes him in the spot where Mike knows it feels almost too good to stand. “Oh, oh my god---”</p><p>“I think you’re ready,” Mike says, because he’s going to explode against Jay’s sweaty, squirming thigh if he has to wait any longer, and being inside him will already be embarrassingly brief. “Do you, uh. Feel ready?”</p><p>“Mike,” Jay says, whining it out, his hands still pressed over his eyes.  </p><p>“Hmm?”</p><p>Jay takes his hands away and shows Mike his muggy gaze, nodding. </p><p>“Fuck me,” he says, breathing the words out in a way that makes them feel brand new, like nothing Mike has ever heard from others or in porn because jesus fucking christ this is <i>Jay</i> saying that, to him.</p><p>“Gonna make you come first,” Mike says, sliding his fingers out. “It makes it more intense, but, uh, I think-- It’ll make it better if you can, just. Take me in while you’re still feeling good.”</p><p>“Fuh, feeling good?” Jay says, one corner of his lips twitching up like he thinks it’s pretty absurd that Mike doesn’t realize he’s already there.</p><p>“Trust me,” Mike says, holding Jay’s gaze while he wraps his fingers around Jay’s cock. They both moan when it twitches in his grip. Jay is close already, and Mike wants to see him come even more than he wants to be inside him, which has never been a thing before. </p><p>Jay arches and thrusts his chest out when he starts to spill over Mike’s fingers, gasping. Mike leans in to bite a nipple. He’s never been so glad to feel someone else’s come coating his hand. With his other hand he gropes for the lube, shifting into position between Jay’s sweat-slick thighs as they spread around him. </p><p>“Juh, jesus,” Jay says, staring up at Mike while he lines himself up. “I nnh, knew I’d like this, so much, so much--” </p><p>“Sex?” Mike says, hesitating before the first push inside. Jay is flushed all over and looks like he’s drifting comfortably for now, sex drunk and sweet. </p><p>“Mhm,” Jay says. He nods once and licks over his puffy lips. “You,” he says. “You’re gonna-- Gonna make me want it all the time.” He whines, pressing his legs in against Mike’s sides. “You’re gonna be so mean.”</p><p>“You like it when I’m mean.” </p><p>Jay grins and digs his teeth into his bottom lip until it’s purple-red. </p><p>Mike pushes into him, holding his gaze. Jay isn’t biting his lip anymore, just staring up at Mike, open-mouthed and wet-eyed, digging his fingers into Mike’s forearms like he’s afraid he’ll get away, even as he slides so deep into the clutching heat of Jay’s body that he’s not fully himself anymore, in the best way, because being inside him feels like being claimed forever.</p><p>“You, you’re gonna be,” Jay says, his breath catching when Mike settles in fully. “So mean.”</p><p>Mike kisses him and gives him a while to adjust, trying to prove the opposite is true, though it does seem like being sweet and careful with Jay is considered mean in his book, like a dirty trick that’s designed to draw him out of himself. At one point they start laughing like idiots, breathing against each other’s faces, and Mike thinks of <i>sing into my mouth</i>, which is a line from one of Jay’s songs on that road trip playlist. Mike would say it now, if he didn’t know Jay would recoil in secondhand embarrassment and bite him, maybe.</p><p>Almost as soon as Mike really gets going Jay starts moaning for it, and he feels even better around Mike’s dick when he’s open just enough to let him move with ease, remade for this, throwing his head back and clawing at Mike’s sides like he wants it harder. Mike comes pretty fast, as he predicted, but by that point he doesn’t care. It just feels good, nothing but, and Jay holds him when he shakes through it, his face pressed to Jay’s throat. </p><p>“Did you dream that the world ended, too?” Mike asks when they’re lying together after, mildly cleaned up and still sweaty, the blankets pushed down to their hips. </p><p>“When?” Jay asks, and Mike laughs. </p><p>Mike falls asleep and wakes up intermittently to the feeling of Jay petting him, then to Jay climbing out of bed to go get something for them to eat. They’re both starving. Jay returns with sub sandwiches that he procured in ways unknown to Mike, who feels like Jay only left the bed two minutes ago. He sits up and accepts one, feeling like he’s in a version of that dream where Jay came back from his scouting mission only to feed him, fuck the rest of them.</p><p>“What if we were the last two people left on Earth?” Mike asks.</p><p>“I’d consider it a victory,” Jay says.</p><p>They’re eating the sandwiches in Jay’s bed, nothing playing on the TV that sits on the dresser across the room. Lettuce shreds are dropping all over the place. It’s so unlike Jay to make a mess. Mike keeps leaning over to kiss him between bites. </p><p>“This is my last sub,” Jay says, holding what’s left of his up in Mike’s face. “I’m gonna give up bread.”</p><p>“That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard,” Mike says. “You’re perfect. Your ass is well-served by bread.”</p><p>Jay snorts like that’s inaccurate but also takes a huge bite, blushing. Mike hopes this means he at least believes it a little, already. </p><p>“Give up bread if you must,” Mike says, holding his finger in Jay’s face so that Jay will do the little nose scrunch thing he loves. “But remember how long you denied yourself some dick, and how that played out.”</p><p>“Played out pretty good, actually,” Jay says, with his mouth full. </p><p>Mike tries to hold in his laugh but ultimately can’t. Jay is right, and he even looks smug about it, but Mike doesn’t mind.</p><p> </p><p>**</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>So hard to pick a theme song for this because I made a whole Jay's road trip playlist soundtrack to listen to while I wrote it, but a lot of that is anachronistic anyway (;__; 2011 feels like the distant past nooo), so here's the theme song:</p><p> </p><p>  <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bVZTMyQ3SsU">Halloween by Phoebe Bridgers</a></p><p> </p><p> </p><p>I was going to also link the Cotton Eye Joe remix mentioned in this, which is this particular one I have from I think a Jock Jams CD I bought at Media Play in middle school (and no that's not a midwest specific chain, Jay, and neither is Jimmy John's, lol...), but it's a remix so cursed it doesn't even exist on the internet, it would seem -- perhaps for the best.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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